It’d made perfect sense, explained like that. And yet . . . I looked around at the worshippers once more—the men and women who pleaded for mercy and cried for my blood on the same breath. How could both be in their hearts?

“Lou, I’m—” He’d cleared his throat and forced himself to look at me. Those blue eyes had shone with sincerity. With regret. “I shouldn’t have shouted earlier. In the library. I’m . . . sorry.”

Our lives reflect our hearts.

Yes, it’d made perfect sense, explained like that, but I still didn’t understand. I didn’t understand my husband. I didn’t understand the Archbishop. Or the dancing boy. Or his father. Or Jean Luc or the Chasseurs or the witches or her. I didn’t understand any of them.

Conscious of the Chasseurs’ eyes on me, I forced a smirk and bumped my husband’s hip, pretending that it’d all been a show. A laugh. That I’d just been goading him to get a reaction. That I wasn’t a witch in Mass, standing amongst my enemies and worshiping someone else’s god.

Our lives reflect our hearts.

They might’ve all been hypocrites, but I was the biggest one of all.

Madame Labelle

Reid

The next evening was the first snowfall of the year.

I sat up from the floor, brushing back my sweaty hair, and watched the flakes drift past the window. Only exercise worked the knots from my back. After stumbling upon me on the floor last night, Lou had claimed the bed. She hadn’t invited me to join her.

I didn’t complain. Though my back ached, the exercise kept my irritation in check. I’d quickly learned counting didn’t work with Lou . . . namely, after she’d started counting right along with me.

She slammed the book she was reading down on the desk. “This is absolute drivel.”

“What is it?”

“The only book I could find in that wretched library without the words holy or extermination in the title.” She lifted it up for me to see. Shepherd. I almost chuckled. It’d been one of the first books the Archbishop had allowed me to read—a collection of pastoral poems about God’s artistry in nature.

She flounced to my bed—her bed—with a disgruntled expression. “How anyone can write about grass for twelve pages is beyond me. That’s the real sin.”

I hoisted myself to my feet and approached. She eyed me warily. “What are you doing?”

“Showing you a secret.”

“No, no, no.” She scrambled backward. “I’m not interested in your secret—”

“Please.” Scowling and shaking my head, I walked past her to my headboard. “Stop talking.”

To my surprise, she complied, her narrowed eyes watching me scoot the bed frame from the wall. She leaned forward curiously when I revealed the small, rough-hewn hole behind it. My vault. At sixteen—when Jean Luc and I had shared this room, when we’d been closer than brothers—I’d gouged it into the mortar, desperate for a place of my own. A place to hide the parts of myself I’d rather him not find.

Perhaps we’d never been closer than brothers, after all.

Lou craned her neck to see inside, but I blocked her view, rifling through the items until my fingers grazed the familiar book. Though the spine had begun to split from use, the silver thread of the title remained pristine. Immaculate. I handed it to her. “Here.”

She accepted it gingerly, holding it between two fingers as if expecting it to bite her. “Well, this is unexpected. La Vie éphémère . . .” She looked up from the cover, lips pursed. “The Fleeting Life. What’s it about?”

“It’s . . . a love story.”

Her brows shot up, and she examined the cover with newfound interest. “Oh?”

“Oh.” I nodded, biting the inside of my cheek to keep from smiling. “It’s tastefully done. The characters are from warring kingdoms, but they’re forced to work together when they uncover a plot to destroy the world. They loathe each other initially, but in time, they’re able to set aside their differences and—”

“It’s a bodice-ripper, isn’t it?” She waggled her eyebrows devilishly, flitting through the pages to the end. “Usually the love scenes are toward the back—”

“What?” My urge to smile vanished, and I tugged it from her grasp. She tugged it back. “Of course it isn’t,” I snapped, grappling for it. “It’s a story that examines the social construct of humanity, interprets the nuance of good versus evil, and explores the passion of war, love, friendship, death—”

“Death?”

“Yes. The lovers die at the end.” She recoiled, and I snatched the book away. My cheeks burned. I never should’ve shared it with her. Of course she wouldn’t appreciate it. She didn’t appreciate anything. “This was a mistake.”

“How can you cherish a book that ends in death?”

“It doesn’t end in death. The lovers die, yes, but the kingdoms overcome their enmity and forge an alliance. It ends in hope.”

She frowned, unconvinced. “There’s nothing hopeful about death. Death is death.”

I sighed and turned to place the book back in my vault. “Fine. Don’t read it. I don’t care.”

“I never said I didn’t want to read it.” She held out a hand impatiently. “Just don’t expect me to develop your weirdly evangelical zeal. The plot sounds dreary, but it can’t be worse than Shepherd.”

I clutched La Vie éphémère with both hands, hesitating. “It doesn’t describe grass.”

“A decisive point in its favor.”

Reluctantly, I handed it to her. This time, she accepted it carefully, examining the title with new eyes. Hope flickered in my chest. I cleared my throat and stared behind her at a dent in the headboard. “And . . . it does have a love scene.”

She cackled, flipping through the pages eagerly.

I couldn’t help it. I smiled too.

A knock sounded an hour later. I paused in the washroom, shirt halfway over my head. The tub half full. Lou made an exasperated noise from the bedroom. Pulling my shirt back down, I opened the newly repaired washroom door as she tossed La Vie éphémère on the quilt and swung her legs from the bed. They barely reached the floor. “Who is it?”